Kunitz comes back to Anaheim a champion

Chris Kunitz was back at some familiar surroundings Monday as he skated through a workout at Anaheim Ice but apparently he's already forgotten how to get to the rink.

“I thought I was giving the guys good directions when we were getting over here,” he said. “The bus driver went the other way. A little sightseeing.”

Kunitz is back with the Pittsburgh Penguins as he faces the Ducks for the first time since he was traded right before the deadline last March for defenseman Ryan Whitney.

The trade that left both Kunitz and the Ducks unhappy at the time couldn't have worked out any better for the winger as he became a two-time Stanley Cup champion when the Penguins upset the Detroit Red Wings last June.

“It's kind of funny,” he said. “In 10 years, you might sit back and say, ‘Wow, if something would have happened this way, maybe you never would have wound up with any.' But for the way it worked out, I'm fortunate to be with two good really teams that won the Stanley Cup.”

Faced with Scott Niedermayer unsure about playing another season and the possibility of having to deal Chris Pronger for salary-cap reasons in case Niedermayer returned, Ducks general manager Bob Murray dealt Kunitz in order to get a long-term answer on the blue line in Whitney.

Kunitz's declining numbers since his career-best 25-goal, 60-point campaign in the Ducks' Cup-winning 2006-07 season and his $3.5-million salary made him expendable. But this was the team that gave him his big break and it hurt.

“I mean, it caught us off guard, that's for sure,” he said. “It was an emotional time for us. My wife being pregnant and being so far along in the pregnancy, yeah, it had its effect.

“It was a great group of guys here. A pretty tight-knit group and I spent a lot of time with them. It was a very emotional time.”

Making it easier was the fact that Kunitz joined a team that had reached the Cup final the year before but had been struggling to remain in the playoff picture at the time of the deal.

The Penguins, of course, turned things around and the rest is history. Kunitz, however, didn't what kind of situation he was entering into.

“You don't know,” he said. “That's the best-case scenario, right? That's what you think. The potential of going to a new team with young, talented guys. That's what the goal is. But right off the bat, when you look at both teams, fairly at the bottom of the standings and trying to make the playoffs … it's your goal, but is it realistic? I don't really know.”

It's in the past now. Time has healed those wounds. Winning the Cup again certainly helps.

“We always have good memories of everything that we had while we were in Anaheim and things like that,” he said. “But it's just part of the business. You have to go and move on. It's nice coming back and maybe seeing some friendly faces and things like that. But it's just another game.”

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